


The Bad Horse Job

by Halbereth



Category: Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog, Leverage
Genre: Crack, Gen, Humor, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-19
Updated: 2020-06-19
Packaged: 2021-03-04 01:15:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,052
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24805294
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Halbereth/pseuds/Halbereth
Summary: Hardison decides to take on the Evil League of Evil. Parker doesn't like horses. Eliot has a headache.
Comments: 14
Kudos: 21





	The Bad Horse Job

"I know what our next job is," Hardison said, grinning, as he sorted through the mail. "Should be a fun weekend."

Dealing with physical mail didn't usually make Hardison happy unless he'd ordered something, and these were all envelopes, not packages. Eliot frowned.

Parker, however, hopped gleefully over the back of the couch. "Oooh, what is it?"

"A while ago, I sent out a test application to the Evil League of Evil," Hardison explained, holding up a large square envelope with some kind of horseshoe-shaped seal on it. "Looks like they bought it." He slit the envelope open and, somewhere, bright, driving music began to play. Then, as he stared, three vaguely cowboy-looking men appeared behind him and bounced gently in place as they began to sing.

_You've got a letter from Bad Horse,_

_The Thoroughbred of Sin_

_He got the application that you just sent in!_

_It needs evaluation, so let the games begin_

_A heinous crime, a show of force_

_(A murder would be nice, of course)_

_Bad Horse, Bad Horse_

_Bad Horse, he's bad_

_The Evil League of Evil is watching so beware_

_The grade that you receive will be your last, we swear!_

_So make the bad horse gleeful_

_Or he'll make you his mare_

_You're saddled up, there's no recourse,_

_It's high-ho Silver!_

_\--Signed, Bad Horse_

And then they were gone.

"Where did those guys come from?!" Hardison demanded.

"Where did they go?" Parker asked, looking around.

Eliot stared at Hardison. "You decided to take on _Bad Horse_ without telling us?"

"Sure." Hardison shrugged. "How tough can he be?"

"I don't like horses," Parker complained.

"Babe, it's just a name, I don't think he's a real horse," Hardison chuckled.

"Yeah, he is," Eliot said angrily. "And he's--he's _tough,_ okay? Dammit, Hardison. You don't get to be the head of the _Evil League of Evil_ without--"

"Wait, what? He's a _horse?"_ Hardison asked. "Like, an actual--"

"Did you do any research for this at all?"

"Man, Bad Horse is practically a myth. Frankly, I thought he was that Josh Wheedle guy's brother, but I think that was one of the singing dudes."

"He's a horse." Eliot crossed his arms and glared at Hardison. "And he's bad."

"Okay, well, still. Horses. They're herbivores. How nasty can they be?"

At this, Parker stared at him in mute indignation. Eliot sputtered, "How--how nas-- Have you ever been bitten by a horse?"

" _Bitten?"_ Hardison's eyebrows flew up. "Eliot, it's me. I don't go outside where I could apparently be _bitten_ by _horses."_

"They're not poisonous, right?"

"No, Parker, horses aren't poisonous," Eliot sighed. "They've just got big, flat, square teeth to chomp with, and I've seen Bad Horse bite someone to hold him in place while he kicked him."

Hardison flinched. "Yeah, I know _that's_ bad."

"Bad Horse isn't a fun weekend job, man."

"Weeeeell, this doesn't have a specific deadline," Hardison said, glancing at the letter. "We've got some time. But, uh..."

"What?"

"I mean, when I sent this, I was kinda thinking about taking down the _whole_ Evil League of Evil, you know?"

"Mm. If it's just Bad Horse, somebody's eventually going to take over," Parker said thoughtfully.

"Right!" Hardison pointed at her. "Exactly. This way, we have the element of surprise."

"The whole League?" Eliot asked ominously.

"It's not actually that much worse," Hardison said. "I mean, OK, Bad Horse himself, I messed up there. But information on the rest of the League is out there, and honestly? Since the whole Dr. Horrible/Hammer Guy thing blew up, none of them are all that hard to beat. The worse one is probably Tur-Mohel, and he's not much of a challenge."

"That Matzoh Bomb Soup thing had an entire city constipated for weeks," Eliot growled.

"So we'll eat some Rasin Bran first," Hardison said, shrugging. Parker made a face. "Seriously, I'm pretty sure one of the guys in my guild is part of the Minion. He's not a bad dude. It'll be fine."

Eliot pinched the bridge of his nose. "Parker, you OK with this?"

"It's OK to not like this horse," she said, nodding. "It'll be good for me. And the job sounds fun.

~~~

"Alright," Eliot said as they moved the last bubbling beaker into place. "Now, Hardison, remember, don't oversell it."

Hardison gave him a look from under his ridiculous green-tinted goggles. The goggles were shoved up on his forehead, revealing his blue eyebrows. His sweeping jacket, somewhere between wizard's robe and labcoat, was also blue with odd teal stains. Underneath, he wore an argyle vest, black jeans, and leather boots, all also stained. "I'm not going to oversell it, man. These are _supervillains._ There's no such thing as over the top."

Eliot supposed he had a point. "OK." He glanced up, where Parker was whispering to herself, dangling from a rig in the rafters. "You still alright with this?"

She gave him a tight grin. "Sure."

"I can do it if you're not."

"No, I've got it," she said, and then went back to her whispered mantra: "Tase the horse. Tase the horse."

"It's actually a cattle prod," Hardison said helpfully. "Super-charged."

"He's not a cattle," Parker said scornfully. "He's a horse. And I'm going to tase him." She looked at Eliot. "Get in position."

Eliot nodded and went to lurk in the corner of the room. He was dressed in a variant of what Parker called his Standard Thug #3 Outfit: beat-up jeans, boots, t-shirt, uniform jacket. In this case, the uniform's patch was just a picture of goggles with lightning coming out of them.

Hardison really had too much fun with this stuff.

"OK," Hardison muttered, checking a monitor, "they're here." He tapped a button for the intercom and let out the spooky laugh he'd been practicing (endlessly, for _days_ ) to complete the role of Kill Fry, Mad Science Guy. "Enter, honored guests," he cackled.

In just moments, there was the sound of feet--and hooves--outside the door. With the push of another button, the door swung open and Hardison stalked to the center of the room, coat thing billowing behind him. Above, in the shadows, Parker tensed and hefted her mega-taser.

"Come in, come in," Hardison purred, spreading his hands. "Welcome to my lair. Bad Horse--may I call you Bad?"

**Author's Note:**

> Apparently the antidote to insomnia is crackfic.
> 
> This takes place post-Season Five and I am not yet post-Season Five, so the Leverage parts could be wrong; it also takes place post-the once-promised sequel to Dr. Horrible, which will probably never happen, but let's say that there was some huge dust-up between Billy and Captain Hammer.
> 
> Tur-Mohel is from the extras on the Dr. Horrible DVD, where people submitted their own applications to the Evil League of Evil. He is the only applicant _or_ League member that I remember besides Bad Horse, because I am apparently that weak for terrible puns, even if I need them explained to me. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFAhVyyL3SU
> 
> Matzoh is very binding if that's all you're eating; matzoh ball soup has lots of other ingredients that means it probably wouldn't be a problem, but I wanted Eliot to have some food-related supervilliany to gripe about.


End file.
